Tavis Smiley's FAIL UP Now Out In Trade Paperback

In 2009, TIME magazine named Tavis Smiley to its list of "The World's 100 Most Influential People." Surely such an overachiever could never be labeled a failure. A successful small business owner, notable philanthropist, New York Times best-selling author, host of his own national television and radio programsthese aren't the descriptions we would normally hear about someone who'd been fired or arrested, who left college degreeless, or said "no" to a dream-come-true opportunity in the profession he longed to break into.

Yet all of theseand moredescribe a Tavis Smiley who has embraced his "success scars" in FAIL UP: 20 Lessons on Building Success from Failure, now available in trade paperback (ISBN: 978-1401933913, $14.95, SmileyBooks paperback, 288 pages, February 5, 2013). FAIL UP is a lesson plan for those confronted by the inevitable letdowns, fall-throughs, and setbacks of life. Broken into 20 chapters, Tavis' examples are pulled from his private and professional life; you'll also find classic examples of overcoming what at first appeared insurmountable. FAIL UP challenges us to take what looks like an ending and make a new, better, more true beginning.

"Failure is an inevitable part of the human journey. FAIL UP is the trampoline needed when you're down. When you take the time to learn your lessons, when you use those lessons as stepping-stones to climb even higher than you were before, you transcend failure,'" Tavis writes. "I hope the 20 lessons presented in the following chapters will offer you a new way to think about your failures. I'm a witness. You can fail up."

In FAIL UP, Tavis examines:

How the mayor of Bloomington, Indiana, taught a young Tavis a lesson about forgiveness, even after the trust of his employer and the public had been violated.

What being "on" all the time in the Internet age means, as he recounts how an interview with Robert Townsend nearly went disastrously off script.

The value of keeping cool under pressureespecially given the heated rhetoric of our time.

How he nearly scuttled an equality campaign against CompUSA when he hadn't checked his facts.

The importance of "staying in your lane" as a way of maximizing potential.

Where America is headed and the challenges facing us along the way, as we become a more diverse nation.

How turning down a job doing exactly what he wanted helped him prepare for the successful person he would become.

Whether you are young or old, student or professional, media mogul or working woman, FAIL UP, now out in trade paperback, shows how all of us can turn a step back into a surge forward if we seize the opportunities found in failure.